Mpho’s dreams revolved around passing and getting that degree. She needed credentials to start her career in fashion, because one day she wanted all the top women in South Africa to wear Mpho Kgosiemang’s designs. Her brand would be a household name. But for that to happen she needed to get through the graduate fashion show, and that was proving to be more difficult than she had thought it would be.
“I don’t know,” Mpho answered Marika’s question at last, reaching for her sandwich. “My designs look so good on paper. Though, right now I just can’t seem to find the fabric I need. I find things that are just about right, but not perfect. You know what I mean?”
“I think you’re too picky.”
“I have to be, Marika. Our lecturer told us sometimes the big fashion houses pitch up for these things. They’ve hired students immediately after the show. So I need to be perfect. Imagine one of the big houses actually came! I could be a fashion designer in just a few weeks. No more chips. No more makwinya and soup. And most importantly – no more Jakes breathing down my neck night and day. If this show goes well, it could make my dream come true!”
Marika shook her head and some of her long blonde hair fell out from under the hairnet she’d stuffed it into. “Still. No one’s perfect, Mpho; you’ll make yourself sick trying to be. Find the best fabric you can and get started. Time is ticking away.”
Mpho knew Marika was right. Some of her classmates were already cutting their dresses and some had even started sewing. Making three designs from paper into finished products was no joke; she realised she had to get going.
She’d been trawling fabric stores and second-hand clothes shops looking for bits and pieces that she liked. So far she had a large piece of tan impala leather she intended to use as a bodice on her evening gown. At a second-hand clothes store in Hillbrow she’d found a broad piece of Ndebele beadwork with turquoise, red, black and white glass beads and flicks of yellow. The trousers of her two-piece suit would have the beadwork in the waistband.
Mpho liked incorporating the vast rainbow of cultures that existed within the borders of her country. She always tried to make designs that resonated with the feeling of being a South African. She had to admit though, Marika was right. She was a perfectionist in everything. She didn’t see any reason to be anything else. Why get something that wasn’t exactly what you wanted? She didn’t understand compromise when it came to the things she loved.
Mpho could hear the till and knew the lunch crowd was streaming in. She quickly ate her last bit of sandwich and gulped down her juice. “We better get back.”
* * *
At five, Mpho and Marika knocked off, making way for the evening shift. Ishmael showed up exactly on time to pick up Marika, as he did most days.
“How’s things, Ish?” Mpho asked.
“Okay. Did Marika tell you I’m buying a new car?”
“No, she didn’t. Job must be going well.”
“Excellent. Got a raise. I’m hoping by next year they’ll promote me, then Marika and I can get married.”
Mpho’s heart jumped at the words. Marriage? Weren’t they too young for that? Mpho and Marika were only twenty-four. Who got married in their twenties in this day and age? Mpho knew she never would. She had plans. Before even thinking of marriage, she wanted her career firmly in place. Marriage wouldn’t be part of her life until she was well into her thirties.
She looked at Marika who was smiling with Ishmael’s long arm around her shoulders and wondered if they understood what they were talking about. Mpho knew Marika’s traditional parents wouldn’t accept an Indian son-in-law; they barely accepted her, a black friend. They’d only met her once, but Mpho was pretty sure she wouldn’t be getting invites to the farm near Rustenburg anytime soon. And she was positive the only way these two would be getting married was if they sneaked away and did it on the sly.
But Mpho wasn’t interested in bursting anyone’s bubble, so she simply said, “That’s great, Ishmael.” She turned to Marika. “I’m going to help my mom get her things home and then I’ll see you at school later.”
“Great, sounds like a plan.”
Mpho rushed across the expanse of Park Station to the bus parking lot. She saw her mother had already packed up most of her table. Mpho hurried to help her. “Hi, Mama, how was your day?”
Mpho rubbed Johnny’s head. He was her cousin Annabella’s five-year-old son. When his mom worked at the dry-cleaners across town, he spent the day with Mpho’s mother. “How’s things, Johnny?” Mpho asked, picking him up and giving him a hug and a kiss.
Mpho and Annabella had grown up together like sisters and were best friends for as far back as either of them could remember. They had both lived with their grandmother in Lephalale and gone to school there. When they were doing matric, Annabella’s mom, who’d been living in Johannesburg, died of AIDS. Since then Mpho’s mother had taken over her younger sister’s role. She was Annabella’s mother and Johnny’s grandmother.
“I saw a giant today,” Johnny said to Mpho.
“Did you now? Was he a nice giant?” Mpho asked as she picked up the folding table with her free hand and they started walking home.
“He gave me twenty-five cents.” Johnny opened his small hand, grimy from a day at the bus terminal. In his palm were a collection of coins. “I’m going to give it to my mom.”
“Well, aren’t you a sweetie.” Mpho loved Johnny as if he was her own son. When Annabella told her she was pregnant Mpho was disappointed but she would never have wanted her cousin to get an abortion. Johnny’s birth meant Annabella’s schooling came to an end, though it didn’t matter that much because her love of fun had already pretty much ruined her chances to pass matric.
Annabella wasn’t like Mpho. She’d never had plans. She liked having fun and being Johnny’s mother. That was enough for her. A career wasn’t something she thought about much. At least not her own career, but she was always looking out for Mpho’s. She liked to cut out photos of interesting styles and fabrics from magazines she read and always gave them to Mpho. They’d often sit up at night going though Mpho’s designs. Annabella would advise her on how something might be improved. Mpho often wondered who longed most for her to become a fashion designer – Annabella or herself.
The family lived in a high-rise in Hillbrow. Not the safest spot but the only place they’d been able to afford since Mpho’s father died. He was a bus driver and was killed in an accident when Mpho was only seven. With his death things became hard for her mother. That was when she and her brother Jakes were sent to the village to stay with their gran. But when their mother got beaten up by some local thugs, Jakes moved back to Hillbrow to stay with her. That was the start of his role as family protector. Although she was terribly homesick, Mpho had remained in Lephalale where she was safe and able to finish her education.
But now they were all back together in No 78. The neighbourhood was still pretty rough but they managed. Mpho dreamed of the day when she would have enough money to buy her mother a house in the suburbs so that she would not have to sit for hours in the exhaust fumes of hundreds of buses, eking out a living on the tiny profits from sweets and airtime. At least now, with Jakes working as a mechanic and Mpho and Annabella working too, things were marginally better.
They arrived at No 78 just as Annabella turned around the corner coming
